Martian 'Canali'

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March 14, 2010

Italian astronomer Giovanni Schiaparelli produced this map of Mars based on his observations in 1877, when Mars passed especially close to Earth. Schiaparelli described some of the line-like features he saw as "canali," or channels, but the word was translated into English as "canals," implying that they were created by Martians. The idea of the Martian canals persisted into the mid-1900s.